"One should either write ruthlessly what one believes to be the truth, or else shut up." — Arthur Koestler

“Needless to say, no one at National Review shares Derb’s appalling view of what parents supposedly should tell their kids about blacks in this instantly notorious piece here.”

Yes, but have you fired him for it, Rich? What the hell kind of “needless to say” bulls–t are you trying to play on us here?

Mind you, I’m not saying you should fire Derbyshire: A commenter on a previous post raised the possibility that Derb was cleverly parodying a black racialist writer’s version of “The Talk.” So I suppose that some plausible explanation or defense can’t be ruled out.

“Needless to say,” however, they don’t pay you the big bucks to waffle in times of crisis, Rich. Your executive authority must be exercised and, with this howling Internet lynch mob demanding Derbyshire’s scalp, you must either satisfy the mob or deal with the consequences.

Obviously, Rich, it would do neither of us — nor Derbyshire, for that matter — any good for me to offer you unsolicited advice. You’ve never taken my advice before, and I don’t expect you to start now.

UPDATE V: One of the things that has bothered me for years is the way some people want to treat political journalists as if they were actually politicians, so that anyone who writes about politics must be “vetted,” as if they were themselves candidates for elected office.

My own understanding of my job is write something people want to read, and get paid for it.

Having the “correct” opinion on controversial issues? Nobody’s ever offered to pay me for that, and I don’t expect any such offers soon. My writing therefore must stand or fall on its own merits, without regard for my ability to win any kind of popularity contest or plebescite.

[Marion] Barry told supporters in D.C.’s Ward 8: “We got to do something about these Asians coming in and opening up businesses and dirty shops. They ought to go.” Once pushed out, Barry, promised, he would replace the foreign invaders with “African-American business people.” Barry then took to social networking platform Twitter to expound on the perils of “dirty” Asian shops in his neighborhood.

The same people who support Marion Barry nevertheless want us to think the real problem in American race relations is John Derbyshire.

His latest provocation, in a webzine, lurches from the politically incorrect to the nasty and indefensible. We never would have published it, but the main reason that people noticed it is that it is by a National Review writer. Derb is effectively using our name to get more oxygen for views with which we’d never associate ourselves otherwise. So there has to be a parting of the ways. Derb has long danced around the line on these issues, but this column is so outlandish it constitutes a kind of letter of resignation.

Comments

Good point, but I would like to see the one-time home of Russell Kirk saved.

http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

Mr. Vadum: What is raaaaacist about the statement, (10i) If accosted by a strange black in the street, smile and say something polite but keep moving.

I gather you live and/or work in a big city. This is sound advice, sadly, just as it is sound advice to do the same for Hispanics and anyone of any color who appears to be homeless. These are sad truths.

http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

While I think John was wrong regarding the former, I do understand where he was coming from. The fact is: the vast, vast majority of the black politicians involved in city [not town] governments have come out of the race huckster / community organizer movements – both of which are part of the Stealth Socialist Movement. With those of other races, there’s not as great of chance. Common Sense, therefore, dictates that any municipality with a black mayor is being run by a Socialist race hustler.

As for the latter point of John’s you cite: sorry, we have accumulated enough anecdotal evidence that, as we see in the Baltimore video cited by Dan Collins, that this is sound advice.

http://thepagantemple.blogspot.com/ ThePaganTemple

If you wouldn’t marry a white liberal-and I sure as hell wouldn’t-why on earth would you marry a black one?

http://thecampofthesaints.org Bob Belvedere

You hurt your argument by citing Joe Sobran, who is an Anti-Semite, and The John Birch Society who are nuts.

daialanye

Far from hurting my argument, that was the gist of it. National Review likes free speech except when they come under criticism for it.

I’m well aware of the charges made against not only Sobran but Buchanan, but National Review didn’t have the guts to let these people lose their arguments on their own but had to condemn them to protect the precious reputation of Bill Buckley and others for “right thinking.”

As for the Birchers, I’ve known and argued with plenty of them. They had (or have) their own peculiar ideas as do Libertarians and Paulites today. Again, though, as also with followers of Ayn Rand, National Review chose the politically-correct stance.

BTW, when Belvedere uses the term Anti-Semite what he really means is (for the most part) Anti-Zionist. I would remind him and others that when speaking either racially or linguistically there are no truer Semites than Arabs.